Circular Economy - Converting Coffee Waste into More Income!
One new way we're looking help farmers to earn more is by converting the waste from coffee production into money. Cascara, for example, is a highly caffeinated tea or lemonade that can be made from the discarded fruit pulp of a coffee cherry but it’s a small and limited market.
There is however also the potential to convert discarded cherries into high quality pectin - a valuable ingredient for the global food and pharmaceutical industries.
It’s the reason why one particular Dutch company called Pectcof caught our attention. They are working on the front lines of food innovation and have developed a method to transform coffee berries into valuable bio-compounds used for the production of food ingredients, biochemicals and second generation bio-fuels (think of sustainable alternatives for arabic gum, dietary fibres, colorants, antioxidants and sugars).
Unlocking Coffee as a Source of Bio-Materials
Their technology has the potential to unlock coffee pulp as a source of bio based materials, and at the same time detoxifying the waste stream of the world's second most traded commodity.
At the FairChain wet mill we’ll take samples of the coffee cherries throughout the season and from various farmers. We’ll map the acidity and sugar content of the pulp. Dry it at various temperatures in a controlled manner. Mill the pulp and skin into small flakes. Bag it and ship it to laboratories to evaluate the exact chemical composition.
We have high hopes the composition will be rich in pectin and other valuable chemical substances potentially leading to a second income stream for farmers. Within one harvest season we want to double revenues, adding a sustainable solution for coffee waste and a big leap for farmer income.
Your support buying FairChain coffee or becoming a member of our Impact Coffee Club all helps this work. That's just another reason to #DrinkPink!